Former President Donald Trump's victory in the US presidential elections could benefit the Philippines, Finance Secretary Ralph Recto said Thursday.

In a conference, Recto said: "It appears that a Trump victory is good for equities but for the broad market, rates have been going up maybe temporarily."

"If we look at the map...we're strategically located. If President Trump, being a real estate person, will see the value of the Philippines, then it also may be good for the Philippines," he said.

"On another take, if President Trump will be good for global security and if we have less geopolitical tensions and wars, then that should be good for everyone,” he added.

In an ambush interview on the sidelines of the conference, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) Chairman George Barcelon said Trump’s victory was a “positive development”.

“Even before the election, former President Trump talked about stopping the war in Russia and Ukraine. So if he's able to do that, that's a very positive development, because of uncertainty,” Barcelon told reporters.

“ So, having said that, I think the crisis on those commodities coming out of both Ukraine and Russia will stabilize. So that's good for the world. And we in the Philippines, we import food-related items and also energy, coal,” he added.

According to Barcelon, it was important for the Philippines to get more trade preferences with the US.

“What's important really for us with the US is, we should be able to get more trade preferences. You know, we export garments in the US. We hope we can get some preference in tariff, we can export more, so that we can trade more garments, (create more) factories and create more jobs,” Barcelon said.

Barcelon said that the PCCI looks forward to the US government giving them more funding for skills set training after they signed a memorandum of understanding with the US Chamber of Commerce last year.

“We hope that with this collaboration with the US government on skills training, we would like to go up the value chain, especially now that we're talking about AI and advanced manufacturing,” he said. Jaspearl Tan/DMS